h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

As in .. full of events. Three birthdays coming up - mine, my mother's and son No 2's.

This morning some of us from work went for a talk on the legal side of export trade, contracts etc. The chappie giving the talk was a good talker and made it easy to digest. At one point, I did think "Eh? - What was that?", until he realised he'd been talking above our heads and explained it again - we're only little office girls, we're not qualified lawyers, after all. In fact, it's not really our job to do all that, but the accounts department and the marketing department refuse to bother about all those details, and the Sales Director and the CEO are only interested in the bottom line, so someone has to make sure we don't break the law or let someone diddle us out of a 6 or 7-figure sum, and that's down to us, apparently.

Tomorrow is choir practice. We are doing a short meditative service on Sunday evening (early - before we go off to the James Bond dinner).

On Friday night, my son's in-laws are coming to see our holiday photos and the pictures of their grandson (he *is* their grandson as well as ours!).

I have a hairdresser's appointment and then I plan to go swimming on Saturday (free admission if it's your birthday!) and then finally get to see the Buran in the Technikmuseum, which I've been wanting to do for about 5 years now, since they put it there. May as well watch the space film at the adjoining Imax to round it off.

On Sunday I've got tickets for a James Bond-themed dinner. No sure what to expect there, but it'll be something special anyway.

Am off to my mother's for a very short stay the weekend after that. I hope to have (a) found my Christmas cards and (b) at least sorted out my Christmas card list so I can take all my cards for the UK with me and post them while I'm there. I can write them whilst there, too.

So the second half of November is pretty packed. Hope I manage to remember to write a journal every day!

Here's an explanation of what the Buran is:

http://speyer.technik-museum.de/en/spaceshuttle-buran

Thanks for the link, TC

I used to sing an old song called "The bells of Speyer."

Should there be a song about the space shuttles of Speyer?

[Amy P]

I never quite got James Bond. I first came across one of the novels in 1962 when I was 14, and found it too sadistic for my taste, even though I was a fairly gruesome teenager in my own way.

I took my wife to the film of Dr No (I think while we were engaged, which would make it 1969) but we actually left on account of the gratuitous violence.

Watched various ones since, but never saw what the fuss was about.

There's a sort of genre of macabrely humorous [or humorously macabre] films. Some lean more toward the humorous end of the scale ["Eating Raoul"], and some more toward the macabre [Tarantino's latest films].

I guess the key issue is how seriously you want to take such things. At his best, Bond is winking at you. Bond is not always at his best, though. After Sean Connery, the actors who played Bond were a mixed bag. Daniel Craig has the wink part down pat, and I'm content with that.

I was reading "Entertainment Weekly," which had an article on "Spectre." The creative team for that movie worried that "Skyfall," the previous film in that series, was so good that anything after that would suffer by comparison and make less money .

Well, you and I have no reason to care how much money a film makes, unless one [o both] of us has money invested in the studio that makes it. I sure don't.....

Connery made the role his own, but of the following lot I thought the most Flemingish Bond was Pierce Brosnan.

The nudge-wink factor put me off completely. I also found the casual sex unconvincing, tawdry, and unworthy of some good actresses.

Worst of all was Roger Moore, playing it all like a Carry-On movie.

My mother surprised me the other day, when I told her we were going to see Spectre, that she thought Sean Connery was the only true James Bond. Pierce Brosnan was my ideal Bond, too. Recumbentman - it's probably an English thing (OK, so Connery and Brosnan aren't English, I know) so you're excused not quite getting it. The Germans love it, anyway, hence the event. It seemed a nice idea for a birthday celebration, and I'm going to enjoy it, come what may!!!

I too like Pierce Brosnan a lot, and not just for James Bond. He only made three Bond movies, though. Craig has made four so far, and who knows how many more are yet to come? Brosnan didn't need Bond to be considered a major talent. When I look at a list of Craig's award nominations and wins, the Bond entries are conspicuous. Brosnan did have some Bond nominations, granted, but without them he would hardly have been deprived of attention.

I've always hated James Bond because of his treatment of women.